383 Posts Found

In thinking about change, I like to use a simple three-part framework: capturing attention, securing approval, and orchestrating adoption. Like any simplifying framework, this has limitations. But it has one primary benefit: It emphasizes the need to go slow to go fast. What do I mean? Investing sufficient time and effort to gain attention and secure approval will increase the likelihood that organizations will adopt … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Susan Cramm | Source: strategy+business | Subjects: Change Management, Management, Organizational Behavior

Transformational change is still hard, according to a new survey. But a focus on communicating, leading by example, engaging employees, and continuously improving can triple the odds of success.

Content: Article | Authors: Angelika Reich, Dana Maor, David Jacquemont | Source: McKinsey Quarterly | Subjects: Change Management, Organizational Behavior

Online communities are helping companies engage with employees to accelerate change.

Content: Article | Authors: Arne Gast, Raul Lansink | Source: McKinsey Quarterly | Subjects: Change Management, Management, Organizational Behavior

Companies can tap their natural advantage when they focus on changing a few important behaviors, enlist informal leaders, and harness the power of employees’ emotions.

Content: Article | Authors: Carolin Oelschlegel, James Thomas, Jon R. Katzenbach | Source: strategy+business | Subjects: Change Management, Management, Organizational Behavior

Today’s organizations were simply never designed to change proactively and deeply—they were built for discipline and efficiency, enforced through hierarchy and routinization. As a result, there’s a mismatch between the pace of change in the external environment and the fastest possible pace of change at most organizations. If it were otherwise, we wouldn’t see so many incumbents struggling to intercept the future.

Content: Quotation | Authors: Gary Hamel, Michele Zanini | Source: McKinsey Quarterly | Subjects: Change Management, Organizational Behavior

If your organizational culture has these five characteristics, all attempts to implement strategic change will likely be doomed.

Content: Article | Author: Quy N. Huy | Source: INSEAD Knowledge | Subjects: Change Management, Management, Organizational Behavior, Strategy

Eli Goldratt’s 1984 classic, The Goal, introduced his “theory of constraints,” the idea that, in the face of interdependencies and variability, maximizing the activity of each part in a system reduces the output of the system. Drawing on the analogy of a scout troop on a hike, Goldratt showed that only one factor determined how fast they would get to their destination: the speed of … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Elizabeth Doty | Source: strategy+business | Subject: Change Management

Organizations need to pay individuals for their skills and knowledge, not for their jobs. In a work situation in which people have changing task assignments, paying the person according to their market value is much more effective than paying the job, particularly when it comes to retaining the right people. When all is said and done, it is people that have a market value, not … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Authors: Christopher G. Worley, Edward E. Lawler III | Source: University of Southern California | Subjects: Change Management, Human Resources, Management, Organizational Behavior

Each [change] leader should be assessed for past performance, current readiness, and future potential across four dimensions: knowledge, soft skills, experience, and motivation and personality traits. Leaders also must have a foundation in adaptability and change leadership. A shortcoming in any one of these can be a warning sign.

However, the right leaders will fill roles in varying ways throughout the journey, from champion of the … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Authors: Jim Hemerling, Lars Faeste, Martin Reeves, Perry Keenan | Source: Boston Consulting Group (BCG) | Subjects: Change Management, Leadership

The process of identifying and prioritizing stakeholders by their level of support for the change effort and their degree of influence in the organization promotes targeted engagement. We find that in many cases, influential supporters are underleveraged and skeptics underengaged. Effective stakeholder engagement sees business leaders arming influential supporters as change agents, giving them the information and messages they need to influence the organization. At … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Authors: Huib Kurstjens, Kimberly Powell, Massimo Busetti, Michael Shanahan, Mike Lewis, Perry Keenan | Source: Boston Consulting Group (BCG) | Subject: Change Management

Boston Consulting Group has created a change management tool called the DICE assessment, which they have been refining since they first wrote about it in HBR a decade ago, and a version of which is now available for online use.

With the aid of the DICE tool, companies can assess the probability of success of change initiatives early in their lives. By evaluating projects with a … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Author: Perry Keenan | Source: Harvard Business Review | Subject: Change Management

As volatility and complexity rise, transformation has become an imperative for most companies, meaning fundamental changes to the strategy, operating model, organization, people, and processes. To transform, companies must take three steps: funding the journey, winning in the medium term, and establishing the right team, organization, and culture.

Content: Article | Authors: Jim Hemerling, Lars Faeste, Martin Reeves, Perry Keenan | Source: Boston Consulting Group (BCG) | Subjects: Change Management, Management, Strategy

Many corporate-transformation efforts fail to deliver lasting competitive advantage. BCG has identified the factors that lead to successful transformations—and the common traps that characterize failures.

Content: Article | Authors: Gideon Walter, Kaelin Goulet, Martin Reeves, Michael Shanahan | Source: Boston Consulting Group (BCG) | Subject: Change Management

We have found, through numerous cultural interventions with a wide range of organizations […] that companies that eschew all-encompassing culture change initiatives and instead focus on three specific elements—critical behaviors, existing cultural traits, and critical informal leaders—have the most success. We call these “the critical few.”

Content: Quotation | Authors: James Thomas, Jon R. Katzenbach, Rutger von Post | Source: strategy+business | Subjects: Change Management, Culture, Management, Organizational Behavior

Companies need to provide some stability in the midst of change. There has to be a mix. People need to be able to count on their leaders and the values of the firm. They need to have a common understanding of what’s within the strategy and what’s excluded from the strategy. There needs to be clarity about the relationships and the development of people. These … [ Read more ]

Content: Quotation | Author: Rita Gunther McGrath | Source: strategy+business | Subjects: Change Management, Leadership, Management, Organizational Behavior

Many organizations try to change but most of their change efforts are doomed to failure from the beginning. The type and amount of change that is attempted is simply beyond the ability of most organizations to implement successfully. Admittedly, some organizations have made amazing transformations. A key barrier in most change efforts is the motivation to change; all too often it is simply missing. We … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Authors: Christopher G. Worley, Edward E. Lawler III | Source: University of Southern California | Subjects: Change Management, Management, Organizational Behavior

Some business leaders retain their common sense and wisdom, even in the face of radical change. They recognize that mood swings occur in predictable patterns. They anticipate what’s coming, and they help others cope by counteracting the emotional fluctuations and mitigating the accompanying risks. Successfully managing the biases and effectively guiding change in this way create significant value.

Content: Article | Authors: Kevin Murphy, Patrick Litre | Source: Bain & Company | Subject: Change Management

Despite the dismal history of corporate-change efforts, there are ways for organizations to successfully manage change—and make sure the changes stick. BCG’s latest report shows how the Change Delta—a disciplined, systematic approach—focuses energy and resources on the change elements that matter most.

Content: Article | Authors: Huib Kurstjens, Kimberly Powell, Massimo Busetti, Michael Shanahan, Mike Lewis, Perry Keenan | Source: Boston Consulting Group (BCG) | Subject: Change Management

Transformation is one of those overused words in business, which can mean almost anything—from a quick-and-dirty restructuring to a full-scale corporate rescue. We define Full Potential Transformation in the most literal sense: a cross-functional effort to alter the financial, operational and strategic trajectory of the business, with a stated goal of producing game-changing results.

In our experience, identifying the need for a broad transformation and implementing … [ Read more ]

Content: Article | Authors: Charles Ormiston, Manny Maceda, Michael Garstka | Source: Bain & Company | Subjects: Change Management, Management

It’s not you, it’s your company. Management Innovation eXchange founders Gary Hamel and Michele Zanini believe that continuous improvement requires the creation of change platforms, rather than change programs ordained and implemented from the top.

Editor’s Note: I found this article to be a bit empty and unconvincing, but perhaps you will disagree.

Content: Article | Authors: Gary Hamel, Michele Zanini | Source: McKinsey Quarterly | Subjects: Change Management, Management, Organizational Behavior